The High Atlas‎

Living in the eastern Middle Atlas, the High Atlas beckoned from afar. Marrakech required a long bus ride through Kenitra and Beni Mellal or a trip to Rabat and then south to Marrakech. I never got to the Toubkal Massif as much as I wanted, and envied volunteers who lived closer. I did climb many of the peaks there, accompanied by friends, and even family. Perhaps as I digitize more of my old Kodachrome slides, I will get into specifics, but this post is a compendium of a number of trips and a tribute to a spot of the world that was important to me, the mountain named Tazaghart.

Today the High Atlas mountains are served well by climbing and hiking guides, but the main sources in my day were the Club Alpin Français’s long out-of-print guide to the Toubkal Massif, the curious guide book, Villes et Montagnes (a guide to cities and mountains, but nothing else), and topo maps. Today there are any number of tourist organizations that will take you on long walks and climbs. And there are good English language guides to the High Atlas by Hamish Brown and Des Clark. In my day, the heritage of the French Protectorate was a number of huts and a larger dormitory at Oukaïmeden, primarily for skiers. That may not have changed much, but I suspect all are used more intensively today. The route up to Toubkal is much more developed.

I have also noticed more young Moroccans climbing Toubkal, and it is nice to see they take that much interest in the natural beauty of their own country. Nature is always under pressure in the Mediterranean world. Morocco has more than twice as many people today as it had when I lived there 50 years ago.

One of the great charms of the place was that the mountains were empty. One seldom saw another human in the high mountains, and, except at Neltner, below Toubkal, the huts were generally empty. I was there at a time when few Moroccans climbed mountains and the French were still leaving Morocco.

Rather than try to assemble all my memories into a single post, I am limiting this one to Tazaghart, in the Toubkal Massif. Future posts will cover Toubkal, Angour, and some day excursions around Toubkal. As I find more of my old slides, I may add to this collection. I realize that they are of uneven quality, but in my day film was expensive and Kodachrome was beautiful, but slow. Exposure was often a problem. I do envy modern photographers who can shoot without running out of film.

Tazaghart

When I re-upped, I went home to the States by way of Paris, where I spent a few days. I went to Chartres to visit its Cathedral, I discovered that I could speak Arabic to Parisian waiters, mostly Algerians, who were delighted to hear their dialect from an American, and I missed an opportunity to hear Georges Brassens perform, for which I will ever experience a sense of loss.

But, in the cold and drizzle, I discovered Au Vieux Campeur, an outlet for camping, climbing, and other outdoors pursuits, on the Left Bank, not far from the Sorbonne. I invested in an ice axe, ropes, down clothes, and other paraphernalia which I thought I would need to climb more mountains. The memories of crossing the Pyrenees were fresh in my mind, and I wasn’t going anywhere unprepared again. The items that I bought got their first use on Tazaghart, my favorite place in the Toubkal Massif, and, later, more extensively in the French and Swiss Alps.

Louden Kiracofe and I had climbed Toubkal by the standard walk-up route in the summer of 1969, as part of a large group of volunteers. Now we would go to Tazaghart, and climb it via the Couloir de Neige, a steep gully filled with snow. We knew it had a bit of real climbing, and some steep snow, but we were up to it. Or so we thought.

Tazaghart caught my attention the first time I read its classic description: “Le plateau est un désert de pierres, plat, nu, vide, si haut perché qu’on n’aperçoit rien sous le ciel.”

A loose translation might be: “The summit is a rocky desert, flat, bare, empty, perched so high there is nothing but sky.” The name tazaghart is Berber and means “little plain or plateau.” What is remarkable is how high it is: over 13,000 feet. Most of the mountains in the area are lower than this. No others have a summit big enough for a football game!

One has a good view of the Tazaghart from Oukaïmeden and Jbel Angour. At Oukaïmeden, the French put up a tableau d’orientation, which identifies most of the mountains in the massif. I have a better picture of it that shows Tazaghart, but I haven’t found it yet.

You find these tableaus, usually installed by the Touring Club of France, now defunct, all over France and in many parts of its former empire. There is one in Fes, for example, that points to Sefrou and Bouiblane, among other places. Though you can see Tazaghart from Oukaïmeden, the most spectacular views of the mountain are from the valley below it and from Jbel Ouanoukrim.

We traveled with Louden’s wife, Ginny, and an old school chum of hers, and stayed at Le Sanglier qui fume, a restaurant-hostellerie run by an elderly Frenchman, at the beginning of the road up Tizi n Test.

Louden and Ginny had stayed there before, after an exhausting winter drive over Tizi n Test, and had been charmed by the warm welcome, decent food, and the fire burning in their room. The owner was Paul Thenevin. Today the hotel is still there, but managed by his son. There was a boar’s head in the dining room, with a pipe in its mouth that puffed smoke.

It was June, I think, when I first went there. The weather was fine, and we drove to Imlil in Louden’s VW station wagon, and found some porters to take us to the de Lépiney refuge owned by the Casablanca section of the Club Alpin Français. As it happened, they only took us to an aluminum shelter much lower in the valley. I think the spot was Azib Mzik. The place was basic, hot, and stuffy.

The women must have stayed there, as Louden and I hiked up to the de Lépiney Refuge, which sits in a beautiful spot that offers views down the valley, and across it to the face of Tazaghart. We wanted to see Tazaghart. The walk up the valley was beautiful.

I think that we came back again to do the Couloir de Neige, I can’t say. It’s hard to imagine leaving the women by themselves below. So it was probably yet another trip. De Lépiney was an early French climber, and instrumental in making climbing a sport for all. He spent much of his life in Morocco, and, sadly, died there in a freak accident at Oued Yquem, a spot where climbers from Rabat still rock climb.

From the azib, the foot of Tazaghart is reached by proceeding directly up valley on a good mule trail. It follows a small stream through some ancient junipers, past a small falls, and eventually emerges above the tree line, in sight of the de Lépiney hut.

The de Lépiney Hut was comfortable. It was not heated, which was no problem in the summer. We left the windows open.

Situated at about 10,000 feet, it was cold during the other seasons, but certainly preferable to camping in the snow.

In any case, late that day, we climbed out of the valley, up behind the refuge, for a good view of the Tazaghart face and the Clochetons de Ouanoukrim.

Most of the Couloir de Neige can be seen. The only serious obstacle is a chimney, which, when the snow is melting, can become a shower.

It was late, and Louden had stumbled and cut himself on a sharp rock so we descended.

Early the next day we entered the Couloir de Neige.

Once we entered it, we found that the snow turned to ice, and our crampons hardly gripped it. Louden had an ice screw, but neither of us had experience cutting steps, so we gave up. I really think it might have been too soon. I think we could have negotiated the chimney, and, once above it where the snow would have been softened by the sun, we could have continued. We had ropes so setting up belays was not a problem. I wish now that we had tried that, but I always remember St. Loup’s La montagne n’a pas voulu. Better to be safe and sound. You cannot count on being lucky. We left the couloir, and continued up the main valley to Tizi Melloul.

Five years later, I was back in Sefrou studying, and Gaylord Barr, my former Peace Corps housemate, showed up for a visit. He brought me a new pair of Reichle boots which I had ordered from R.E.I., and we went down to Marrakech to climb Tazaghart.

It was July or August. Marrakech was hot. In the USA, John Dean had just given testimony to the Senate Watergate committee, and President Nixon’s days were numbered.

We stayed overnight, picking up some supplies, and took a bus to Asni, I think, from which we got a taxi to Imlil.

Gaylord had been to Marrakech several times, and crossed Tizi n Tichka on the way south, but he had never hiked in the Toubkal Area. We hired a mule for the baggage, and left Imlil in the middle of a moonlit night, passing through sleeping villages on the way to Tizi Mzik. The only noise was the clipclop of hooves and an occasional watchdog bark. The full moon provided great views of the valleys and peaks. We reached Tizi Mzik by dawn.

We had good weather. In the summer, bad weather is rare. Just don’t count on finding water along the mountain crests. We stayed a couple of days. The view from the De Lépiney Hut is grand, with a waterfall, an expansive view of the face, as well as pretty views down the valley. I think one can also see the lights of Marrakech far off on the plains below.

Everyone wants to climb Toubkal, but Tazaghart is much more scenic. If one has the time, it isn’t difficult to visit both areas in the same trip, and be rewarded with great scenery.

The easiest route up Tazaghart is up one of the several gullies that furrow the face. We chose one on the right, either Tsoukine or the one to its left. Or maybe the Diagonal. It’s a bit hazy now.

It was easy enough for a local dog, which we had been feeding, to follow us up to the summit, though the dog had to be resourceful to get around a few steep bits. Maybe we did do the Diagonal.

At the summit there were clouds rolling in, and thunder in the distance, so after a brief rest, we descended by way of Tizi Melloul fearing rain and lightning. We got a bit of rain, but no lightning.

The next time, and last time, I visited Tazaghart was in the late spring or early fall  of 1977.

The weather was cold and wet, and I don’t remember climbing anything, but I did witness a spectacular landslide that involved some house-size boulders rolling down one of the couloirs, a good reminder that even easy routes may have unsuspected dangers.

On that trip we captured a dormouse and took it back to Chauen. When I left Morocco in 1978, a Peace Corps couple in Tetuan took the creature and continued keeping it as a pet. It was cute, but dormice are most active at night. We rarely saw it, but we always heard it scurrying in its enclosure after sunset. It was part of a menagerie of cats and tortoises.

Next installment: Toubkal